Nice little study on Tim’s site…
I had actually contemplated something similar before reading this! cool.
The article was written by Mark Stimson (Tim’s apprentice dude), and was published in the last issue of The Piper’s Review. Neat stuff, and great food for thought.
well, the odd thing is when I read this, is reading how others have made synthetic drone reeds, and how their tone can be “harsh”. Seeing how the drone reed sort of works like a saxophone mouthpiece, I couldn’t understand why one wouldn’t want to use a nice, flat sliver of cane like a saxophone reed instead of plastic.
Because any natural material for the tongue can suffer from climate chnages and extremes. I have had the good fortune to be a guinea pig for some of Joe Kennedy’s drone reed experiments over the years: drilled dowel bodies, brass tube bodies, cane tongues, plastic tongues, spruce tongues, pine tongues, etc. They all have their own sound. Its fun to experiment, but eventually you want to find the drone sound that suits your own tastes. Some types are buzzy, some types are more of a smooth hum. Play around with this stuff and find what you like.
djm
The reeds in the article:
Some of the first hybrid GHB drone reeds:
The GHB reeds have plastic bodies.
I just thouht it would be an intersting comparison.
Cheers,
Aaron
They also have screws in the ends for fine tuning.
DG